Men's Basketball Opens Season at SD City Tourney

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The MSJC men's basketball team opened the season over the weekend with a win and a pair of close losses in the San Diego City Knights Invitational.

The Eagles opened the tournament on Friday night with a 103-84 win over LA Harbor. In that game reigning PCAC North Conference MVP Tre Nottingham led the way for the Eagles balanced offense with 22 points. Mat Bradshaw added 14 while Jaryn Taylor had 12. Carl Brown also reached double figures with 11 and Curtis Weathers came off the bench to add 10. Taylor had a double double on the night as he also grabbed a game high 14 rebounds. The Eagles led by 9 at the half and went on to out score the Seahawks by 10 in the second. Twelve different Eagles scored in the victory.

In Saturday night's semi-final game MSJC rallied from a 13 point halftime deficit to give themselves a chance to win, but came up on the short end of a 68-65 score against Fullerton. Nottingham and Taylor once again led the way with Nottingham scoring a game high 21 and Taylor scoring 19 points and grabbing 8 boards. Bradshaw and Jeremy Bonifacio both had 7 points in the loss for the Eagles.

Sunday's third place game was another heartbreaker for MSJC as Citrus hit a shot at the buzzer to win the game 87-86. Brown had given the Eagles a chance to win by making a pair of free throws with 7 seconds remaining before the Owls hit the final shot. Nottingham and Bonifacio tied for team high honors in scoring with 17 a piece on Sunday. Taylor scored 15 while Daryn Evans added 12 points and Davon Sanders had 10. This time it was Nottingham who recorded a double double as he pulled in 10 rebounds, he also had a game high 6 assists.

The Eagles (1-2) will be right back in action this week when they travel to the Fullerton College Tournament. MSJC opens that tournament on Thursday with a 5pm first round game against Chaffey. San Diego City or Cypress will be the Eagles' opponent on Friday.

MSJC's Tre Nottingham averaged 20 points per game in the Eagles opening weekend at the SD City Tournament. The Eagles beat LA Harbor, then lost back to back close games to Fullerton and Citrus.